Mt Setup Using Subdomain

[coolmel]

hi,

 

a few weeks ago i've installed MT on a host without a domain. so the blog config makes use of the actual IP address and user name:

 

e.g. site URL = http://99.99.999.999/~username/blogdir/blog

 

then a few weeks later i setup a "subdomain" to point to the blog;

 

e.g. http://subdomain.domain.org = http://99.99.999.999/~username/blogdir/

 

then i changed the blog config to make use of the subdomain;

 

e.g. site URL=

http://subdomain.domain.org/blog

 

THE PROBLEM? the published version of the blog is behaving like it can't find the templates and the page rendering are all screwed up.

 

i tried reading the MT manual but i can't find the answer. can someone help me to figure it out?

 

- is it because i didn't point the subdomain to the "root-directory" of the host?

 

- or is it all about MT configuration?

 

i appreciate the help.

 

thank you very much.

[LisaJill]

Have you modified mt.cfg to point to your new domain as well as the paths in weblog config?

[MikeJ]

Key thing for the templates problem..... take a look at how it's referencing your style sheet. It sounds like it can't find your css file. Did you rebuild all of the pages after making the changes in the MT config? That *should* fix most if not all references.

[coolmel]

thanks for the quick reply.

 

yeah i modified the weblog config using the new subdomain. no i didn't touch the MT config file. what should i change there?

 

and yup i've rebuilt all the files.

 

do you think it has something to do with me pointing the subdomain to a directory in the host instead of the root directory of my account? i doubt it's the problem.

 

thanks! i appreciate all the help.

[MikeJ]

Whether it's root or not shouldn't affect it, as long as what you have in the blog config matches.

 

In the weblog config core setup, make sure your Site URL is correct (Should be something like http://subdomain.domain.org/blog/) and your Archive URL is correct. Your local paths should not have changed if you didn't move your blog physically to another directory.

 

In your mt.cfg file, you will need to change CGIPath to point to where your mt.cgi file is (how you reference it as a URL using the subdomain). Depending on your setup, you may need to modify StaticWebPath as well.

[coolmel]

thanks. i'll try this tomorrow since the subdomain i'm using is stil currently propagating to point to the root directory instead.

 

however, an odd thing just happened: i closed my browser without logging out of cpanel because i needed to reboot my machine. after rebooting when i returned to my MT logon screen all the graphics/icons/headers are not displaying. i didn't touch the MT config file and StaticWebPath is pointing correctly outside the cgi-bin.

 

StaticWebPath /~buwgdxal/mt-static/

 

what the heck could've happened?

 

help would be much appreciated.

[LisaJill]

The static webpath is actually misrepresented and should be a url.. http://www.******/mt-static/

 

that's how I had mine working, anyway. =)

[coolmel]

Lisa and Mike,

 

do'h! the problem for the images is because i accidentally enabled "Hotlink"... but i did that hours ago and it only took effect now. anyway, i've disabled it and the images are displaying again.

 

but still i'm waiting for the propagation of our subdomain before trying Mike's solution.

 

i will open up again the templates issue if it still doesn't work.

 

thank you very much to both of you for your quick reply.

[coolmel]

ok, that's it. it's still not working.

 

 

i modified MT.CFG to use make use of the subdomain:

CGIPath http://subdomain.domain.org/cgi-bin/mt

 

but MT is reporting that it can't find the configuration file.

"The requested URL /cgi-bin/mt/mt.cgi was not found on this server."

 

is there a step i'm missing? do i have to modify any CGI files?

i didn't think it would this hard.

 

i appreciate the help.

[LisaJill]

If you do it that way it won't work. mt.cfg should point to the real cgi-bin - probably www.domain.org/cgi-bin/mt/

 

If you use subdomain.domain.org then it would try to find it at /subdomain/cgi-bin/mt/mt.cgi.

 

does that help?

[coolmel]

oh, that's not good news. we don't actually have a dedicated domain for the hosted site. we're trying to spoof the URL so that the permlinks will make use of the subdomain's address.

 

e.g. http://subdomain.domain.org/published_pages.html

 

but everytime i change the Weblog config using the subdomain URL, the published pages can't seem to find the .CSS file.

 

i thought it was easy to use subdomain with MT.

 

is there a solution to this?

[MikeJ]

The second part of what Lisa stated should work for you. If you are using cPanel (you don't specify, and you don't appear to be a TCH customer)... cPanel automatically defines a cgi-bin directory for each subdomain, so you could move the MT cgi files into the subdomain's cgi-bin directory.

 

Otherwise, you will need to keep your CGIPath defined the way you originally had it using the IP address.

[coolmel]

yes i am a TCH customer. i have hosting plan but the domain is on a different registrar.

yes i do have access to Cpanel... i'm just not that familiar with website maintenance.

so should i just define a subdomain and move the cgi directory?

i'm just being careful in screwing up my MT installation especially right now that they have MT v3.0

[MikeJ]

If that's all you are using that MT installation for, moving everything to the cgi-bin directory of that subdomain will likely make your life the easiest.

 

If you use cPanel to define the subdomain, it will take care of configuring the cgi-bin for that subdomain for you, otherwise you may need to make changes to your httpd.conf file, or .htaccess files to get the cgi-bin directory to work.

[coolmel]

i just created a subdomain from CPANEL.

i'll try out your suggestion.

i hope this works

 

i'll be back if it doesn't

[coolmel]

drats. still having problems.

 

here's what i've done so far:

- created subdomain

- changed the MT.CFG

"CGIPath http://subdomain.domain.org/cgi-bin/mt/"

 

but i'm getting this error everytime i login to MT.

 

"Not Found

The requested URL /cgi-bin/mt/mt.cgi was not found on this server."

 

any steps i'm missing?

[TCH-Don]

Did you try

CGIPath http://domain.org/subdomain/cgi-bin/mt/

 

the subdomain is really a folder below the domain.org

[coolmel]

done that. but the problem is we really don't have an actual domain for the host.

we're trying to point a subdomain from another registrar and mask the IP address hosted on TCH. is this possible for MT?

 

the problem is everytime i try to change the CGI path using the "http://subdomain.domain.org/cgi-bin/mt" MT can't find the config file for some reason.

[coolmel]

ok. i think i need to backtrack...

 

i restored the MT CGI to its original CGIPath

which is "http://99.99.999.999/~user/cgi-bin/mt/"

 

 

- we've setup a subdomain to point to http://99.99.999.999/~user/

(note: there's NO domain associated with the TCH site where MT and the blogs will be hosted.)

 

- i created a Testblog with the following path:

Local Site Path: /home/user/public_html/testblog

Site URL: http://journals.integralnaked.org/testblog

Local Archive path: /home/user/public_html/testblog/archives

Archive URL: http://journals.integralnaked.org/testblog/archives/

 

- rebuilt all files

 

- but blogsite is rendered as if MT can't find the CSS files.

see http://journals.integralnaked.org/testblog

 

but then if i try referencing http://journals.integralnaked.org/testblog/styles-site.css

then the CSS is displayed.

 

is the problem caused by the fact that MT is installed in a host without a domain and we're trying to map a subdomain from another domain that is hosted somewhere else?

 

will this problem be solved by just getting a new domain pointed to the TCH site?

 

again, to sum it up, here's what i'm trying to do:

1) run an MT installation/blogsite on a different server/host (on TCH) without an assigned domain name

2) create a subdomain from another registrar (in which the domain is hosted on a different server) and point (spoof) it to the MT installation (on TCH)

3) have MT up and running (on TCH) while generating the permalinks using the subdomain.

 

i appreciate the help.

 

thanks.

[coolmel]

hi,

 

it's been a few days now since i last posted a detailed description of my technical issue. i haven't received a response since then. does this mean this technical issue has no known solution at this time?

 

thanks. i appreciate all the help.

[TCH-Rob]

Mel,

 

Sorry about no response for the past few days. We don't offer official MT support, our family volunteers their time to answer what they can when they can. One should not rely on us entirely for this kind of support. Have you posed this question on the MT forums? Unless the masking is causing an issue I don't see why your setup wouldn't work. Of course I don't have much experience with MT so I cant say for sure.

[Zeitgeist]

I'm not entirely certain that I understand what you are doing, but presently I am running a blog on a subdomain at tch and the subdomain isn't even where the mt files are installed. If I can be of any help go ahead and post again. Do you do work for IN.org btw? I work with dharmapop and Stuart Davis so I've spent a lot of time going through IN. Even drove out to Boulder last year for a gathering at which Ken spoke. Fun stuff.